London 2012 Olympic Taekwondo

The perfect combination of finesse, poise, and strength makes an
excellent Olympic taekwondo athlete. Rooted in Korean culture taekwondo,
literally means "to strike with foot", has been passed from generation
to generation for centuries. It is the oldest of all the martial arts
but is by far the most sophisticated. Although the ultimate goal is to
kick your opponent in the torso or neck, the posture and form in which
the fighter starts from is equally as important as landing a solid blow
to the opposition.

The matrial art has had to adapt to Olympic safety and
competition standards in order to become an official Olympic sport. An Olympic taekwondo fight consists of three semi-continuous bouts with one minutes rest in
between. In each round points are tallied by the four judges and by
electric sensors in the chest protector of the fighter. Points are
awarded for three reasons: one point is awarded for a punch or kick to
the chest and an additional point if the defender is spun around(backed
turned toward attacker) by action, a kick to the head is three points
and must be awarded by the one of the four judges. Punches to the head
are not allowed and repeated offense could result in judges stopping the
fight and the offender automatically being disqualified, although this
situation is very rare.

To equal the playing field athletes are separated into four weight
classes, therefore before every match each athlete is required to weigh
in. In Beijing the four classes for men were 58 kilograms(kg), 68 kg, 80
kg, and 80 kg +. Winners of the gold medal came from favorites
Guillermo Perez of Mexico, Son Tae-Jin of South Korean, Hadi Saej of
Iran, and Cha Dong- Min of South Korea, respectively. Looking ahead to
the London 2012 Olympics all are close favorites along with Mark Lopez
of the United States in the 68 kg weight class and Alexandros Nikolaidis
of Greece in 80 kg + weight class. In the other two classes there are
no other definite stand outs, competition has been close over the past
couple years producing not a single stand out.

On the women's side,
South Korea also dominated the medal count taking the 57 and 67 kg
weight classes with rising star Lim Su-Jeong and seasoned veteran Hwang
Kyung-Seon. Maria Espinoza of Mexico took home gold in 67 kg + and Wu
Jingyu of China dominated super Flyweight(49 kg), taking home gold. All
women are primed and ready to retain their titles at the London 2012
Olympics.

Olympic Taekwondo has taken off, gaining viewership across the
board. However with more fans comes more scrutiny, errors in judging
has started the debate should the scoring be completely electronic, head
to toe. Older members of the governing body believe the sport should
remain simple like its origins while the younger athletes claim human
error plays to big of a part in who wins or loses. London says it will
not make scoring fully automated but who knows what the future holds for
Olympic Taekwondo.